Inverted Love
by Blankdiscontinuedaccount
Summary: When Shinji takes a mission to recruit a new vizard into their ranks, he never expected that his life would be completely inverted by a mysterious teen girl. Will he get the girl, or will she succumb to her unrequited love? ShinHimeIchi/Spoilers inside
1. Like taking candy from a Vizard

Rating: M, for adult themes, violence & sexual content (for future chapters)

Copyrighted: All Characters belong to Tite Kubo & Shonen Jump (I do not take credit for it )

Pairing: Shinji Hirako & Orihime Inoe (Many others as well/one sided affections)

Spoiler Alert: I add this at the beginning, because this story contains Manga & Anime spoilers (You have been warned!)

Updates/Story Status: To check on the most recent progress & updates on this story, please visit my profile.

Enjoy the bumpy ride! Comment, and discuss... :)

* * *

"Alright so it's settled. One of us has to go Karakura High to recruit Ichigo Kurosaki." The blond Vizard looked around to the promising group of rejects that stood before him. _Oh boy this is going to be a challenge,_ he thought_. _

"Well don't jump up all at once," Shinji sighed. He scanned the room only to see the usual laziness of his comrades. Lisa's face was buried in what seemed to be the latest adult Magazine, obviously not even acknowledging what he just said. Not that Rose or Love did either, Rose had his iPod on blast listening to the latest Prince of Darkness album and Love was entirely lost in the latest Shonen Jump article about some Manga contraction called, Naruto. Hiyori was not where to be found thank god, he still hadn't recovered from her sandal brutality after he was accidentally walked in on her while changing this morning, though the view he thought was punishment enough. Kensei was in the corner of the warehouse punching the stuffing out of a punching bag. It wouldn't be long till' Mashiro would have to buy a new one; it would be the 2nd this week. Speaking of Mashiro, Shinji spotted her and Hachi playing a game of cards. Although it was obvious that Mashiro was losing, she hardly ever took anything serious, much less a card game. Shinji sighed again and placed his hand over his face in anguish. _What a lively bunch that I have. Centuries before they were great captains and lieutenants, now were reduced to couch potatoes, perverts, and rage heads…oh how the mighty have fallen, _the blond inwardly observed.

"Still no takers huh?" Shinji yelled as he now stood in the middle of the group with thinning patience.

"Shinji you don't have to yell we heard you the first time you idiot," snarled Lisa as she flipped the next page of her porn magazine.

"Ok Lisa, Why don't you go? You're already dressed in a school girl uniform. I'm sure that you will just _blend in _since you can still pass for a 19 yr old for one more year," retorted the de facto leader of the Vizards.

Lisa glared at Shinji's comment, not only was it the first time he bashed her sense of style but she refused to be called old by a fossil with an over grown ego."Damnit, Shinji! I wouldn't be talking. When you're old enough to be my great grandfather's shadow! Besides, why don't you send Mashiro she's young enough looking to pass off as an annoying high school student."

Mashiro looked up from her cards, "No way. I hate school! I didn't like it in the soul society and I don't like it now." Tears started forming in her eyes and in 3 seconds Mashiro was on the ground rolling and kicking throwing a temper tantrum that even a 5 year old would envy."You can't make me, you can't make me!" She childishly whined.

"Well I would gladly go. Although I don't think I would be as convincing as one of you though. A thousands apologies Shinji," Hachi bowed.

Shinji smiled then shuddered in horror when he imagined Hachi in the tiny human high school uniform, he just saved Karakura town from that one.

Mashiro curled her bottom lip, pointing out to the other vizard he failed to mentioned in the corner. "Hey, why don't you send Kensei?"

_That one was obvious, Kensei was such a hot head not only would he injure Ichigo he would fatally wound the whole staff! _Shinji mentally played million of bloody scenarios played out in his head of detention and a dead teacher.

"Che, I wouldn't be caught dead in that high school with those humans, count me out, "growled Kensei.

Hirako rolled his eyes, "Guess that leaves either Love or Rose."

Rose pulled out one of his iPod ear bud from his ear and looked at Love, "Not it!"

Love not grasping the current transaction of verbal agreement scratched the back of his head in confusion," Not it...What?"

Shinji groaned, his suspicions were right all along Love wasn't listening to a word he had said.

"Forget it Shinji, either Rose or Love would just look like villains in those uniforms. Even I would run the other way if I saw them wall down the school halls," Lisa commented.

As much as he hated to admit it, she was right. Both Rose and Loved looked like cliche evil Kung Fu villains and in school uniforms it would surely send Ichigo packing as well as possibly every man, woman and child in a 50 mile radius of them. "Oh, this is goin' well." he griped.

It was then that he felt it…the stabbing, throbbing, blood gushing pain of 57 pounds of furry in the shape of a bright red flip flop. God how he despised flip flops, ever since Hiyori has made it her weapon of choice he couldn't bear to even see them, much less wear them. Shinji remembered a time in which he agreed to accompany Mashiro shopping when they stopped by a shoe shop. Needless, to say the sight of the small mountain of flip flop on sale made him cringe.

"Why are you wasting time baldy? Someone could be speaking to Kurosaki right now and drafting him into our ranks!"

Shinji frowned, debating on how to correctly respond. "I was trying to -..."

A red sandal violently injected his collective answer, and Hiyori waited in a furious scowl for his next answer.

Holding his flared bloody nose and under his hand Shinji cautiously choked out his disrupted explanation. "No one wants to go and enroll into the school."

Following a short pause Hirako flinched, predicting another senseless beating after finishing his statement. However, to his and the other vizard's surprise the freckled preteen withdrew her sandal.

"Fine, then I'll go!" Hiyori spontaneously responded.

"Tsch—please _as if anyone would_ ever believe that yer a high school student instead of a grade student," Shinji sneered.

The young vizard's left eye twitched at his comment, he knew that age was a sensitive issue with Hiyori even dating back to the soul society. Though at first glance you couldn't tell, Hiyori's real age was 135, but due to the slow aging process of Vizard and Shinigami alike, she maintained a youthful appearance of a 12 year old spoiled brat with a Katana strapped to her back. But of course that didn't deter the former captain from holding it against her, especially when it annoyed her to no end.

"You Dick head! What ya mean I look like a grade student!" She irately yelled backed at Shinji.

"Look, Hiyori looks too young. Love and Rose would look like villains from a bad 1970's flick. Mashiro and Kensei simply refuse to go and let's be honest no one would believe that Hachi is a 17 year old student. As for myself I simply have so much on my plate to be spent trying to recruit some brat that may or may not have the potential to even be a vizard, despite what Urahara says." Lisa explained.

The rest of the vizard eyes rolled in unison.

"Since when has reading nudity magazines considered being an important task Lisa," Love rebuked.

"I don't see you complain when you borrow them from me Love!" She quarreled back.

As the de facto leader anticipated, the entire warehouse erupted into a cloud of childish arguing. It was far too much for Shinji to take anymore. He detested noise, but he hated it more when he lived in such closed proximity to it.

"Enough! Shessssssssssh I'll go, if it will shut y'all up already!" The tongue pierced vizard irritably yelled.

"Great Shinji thanks for volunteering." Lisa smiled, as he glared and huffed back at her.

"Guess I should get goin' and do all the necessary paperwork. Sooner or later, Aizen will start to create even stronger and developed Arrancars to flush out Ichigo and the rest of the Shinigami. And if this kid is as strong as Urahara says, he may be our only hope for finally killing the bastard one and fer all." Shinji rested.

The rest of the vizards fell on serious pause as they contemplated on the approaching danger that Aizen was in the process of creating. For centuries they knew it was coming, and even though they bickered and argued among themselves and were a high mismatched group only thrown together by the misfortune that Aizen bestowed upon them, they were still family. The thought of battle and losing that, even if they put on a brave front, terrified them so.

"Here," Hiyori threw a cell phone to the blond vizard recruiter. "I expect you to check in Shinji, persuade Ichigo to join us and then bring him back here so we can access his current abilities. And Shinji, you better not get distracted by any girls I know how much of a pervert you are!"

"Sounds like you're more jealous than concerned for the mission Hiyori," Mashiro teased while making a kiss-kiss face.

"Shut up no I'm not! It's just….just…Shinji is such a lecher that he would be the only one to fuck up a simple mission because he was too busy looking up some tramp's skirt!" She remarked in defense.

"I don't see what the big deal is. As long as I get the mission done, why not have a little fun? Besides I won't be long. How hard could it possibly be to convince one 16 year old teen boy?" Shinji smirked in thought; _this would be easy like taking candy from a vizard._


	2. The New Karakura Transfer

It was 7:30 in the morning when Shinji heard the alarm clock. He dreaded getting up so early in the morning especially since he wasn't exactly a morning person ever to begin with. At the moment he loathed the morning sun peaking through the warehouse windows which robbed him of sleep. He groaned and rolled over on his side and lifted the blanket over his head to escape the sun rays beaming into his eyes. _Just 5 more minutes of peace, _Shinji thought. His thoughts then drifted off to his run in with Urahara the week before. It was at least 20 years since he last saw the Shinigami scientist turned candy maker, he remembered seeing the torn conflict on his face as he apologized for the whole fiasco after the vizards exile to the world of the living. No one blamed him though; we held no grudge towards Urahara, we all knew Aizen was the mastermind behind our untimely demise from the soul society, and the one that cursed and blessed us oddly enough at the same time with the vizard powers we had now. If anything they held more of a prejudice against the Soul society, which was the deepest cut of all, being rejected of the only home you only knew and by the very group of people you once thought of comrades and superiors. Yes it was 20 years ago till last week when the vizards were content with life, until one night they came across a lower class arrancar and when Urahara made his guest appearance. They reacted quickly once Hachi detected a hollow presence slip though his barrier, although the lowly arrancar didn't stand a chance against the group of vizards and was destroyed in a matter of minutes.

"Was that an Arrancar?" questioned Mashiro. The entire group stood around in thought gathered around the charred remains of the dead arrancar.

"Yea but this one wasn't at full strength. That was easy maybe too easy," Love answered.

"Arrancars hardly ever come to the world of the living, what business would it have here?" Lisa said puzzled. It was then that Shinji felt a familiar, yet annoying spiritual pressure sneak from behind. It's Funny, he thought, how he always had perfect timing to meddle.

"Urahara how long are you going to stand there and eavesdrop?" Shinji sighed.

"Ah, so you knew I was there all along didn't you Shinji? I should have known, you always were good at detecting those sorts of things aren't you. Well then, it nice to see you all again. I see you all haven't lost that vizard touch."

"Enough small chat, Urahara what do you want and I know you know why that arrancar was here to, so start talking." Shinji shot back.

"Well, since we are past formalities here. Let me get straight to the point. What you just witnessed is right now. That was indeed an arrancar, however it wasn't fully mature. I expect Aizen will be doing more experimentation to test the waters of his enemies' abilities. My guess would be that this one was sent to see if it could detect and cross Hachi's barrier undetected. Unfortunately, I don't think this Arrancar actually even realized it crossed your barrier until you struck him down, and luckily Hachi did sense his barrier trip." Urahara paused, his eyes fixed on the vizard group that stood shocked in front of him. "It's safe to say that Aizen hasn't fully awaken the _Hōgyoku yet, however it won't be long before he creates an arrancar that will not only slip through Hachi's barrier _, but will be able to surpass your own vizard abilities," Urahara explained.

"So Aizen finally has made his move eh? Has the soul society caught wind of this?" questioned Shinji.

"Not yet, but it won't be long. It seems Aizen is going out of his way to make his creations be known by you all, the soul society, even others. I suggest you find some reinforcements," Urahara shifted his hat and smiled.

"What do you mean by that?" Shinji said his eyes squinting in suspicion. The whole group fell silent only waiting on Urahara's answer.

"Well I'm referring to my own protege of course, the substitute soul reaper Ichigo Kurosaki," Urahara sheepishly said while fanning his fan.

"What? Are you kidding me! What the fuck would we want a substitute soul reaper? And what is a substitute soul reaper anyways? Urahara I could kill you," Barked Hiyori. The clink of Hiyori sword caught everyone off guard, and before her sword has fully out Shinji blocked her while Mashiro and Love held her back. Urahara just stood there in an aura of calm; he knew to expect this, especially from Hiyori and their always strained relationship ever since he became the captain of Hiyori's squad after Kirio Hikifune over 121 years ago. Deep down Urahara always felt as if somehow Hiyori blamed him for Kirio leaving when she accepted a position on the Royal squad, even he knew that she was just lashing out of hurt of abandonment.

"Wait-are you speaking about that punk that invaded the soul society not too long ago," Shinji asked.

"Yes, that very one was who successfully took on the 13 point squad captains and managed to save Rukia Kuchiki from execution. I dread that he also will be pulled into battle by Aizen, and knowing Ichigo he will go in impulsively. Unfortunately that's both his greatest weakness and strength. His development however, continues to build even now but it would seem that the hollow that dwells inside his soul is slowly consuming him. If he can surpass that and harness his inner hollow with his _zanpakutō _he may be our only hopes of defeating Aizen" Urahara remarked.

Shinji frowned, "So you're saying that-He a human substitute soul reaper has…"

"Undergone hollowification," Urahara paused, "But lately his hollow instinct seems to be taking over a lot more than he's willing to admit. He won't come to me about it, but I'm sure that if a certain masked army would take interest in him that he may come around to accepting that he's vizard."

"I don't know why you subjected some street kid into hollowification or how, but that's the least of my concerns right now. So let me get this straight Kisuke. You want us to take him in and teach him to control his inner hollow correct? "Shinji pointed out. Urahara nodded.

"It won't be easy though. He maybe just a kid but he's incredibly strong and potentially dangerous. He's stubborn but he's driven. Don't underestimate him, may have and fallen," Urahara added.

"Well, unfortunately it's not for you or Ichigo to decide who we take into our ranks. It's US, and if he's as strong as you say, it couldn't hurt to take a look at em', especially since it sounds like he's already one of us. But heed my word of warning Kisuke, this kid fails and we won't hesitate to kill him. You got that? "Shinji murmured.

Urahara tipped his hat in agreement."You can't miss him with the bright orange hair, leaking high spiritual pressure, and arrogant smirk on his face. He shouldn't be hard to find among the local high school students, especially since he's the one terrible at detecting spiritual pressures. So it's settled until next time my vizard friends," Urahara said as waved goodbye.

"God, that guy is so annoying." Shinji said as picked his nose. The group still laid in silence as all digested the news Urahara just dawned on them. It was unspoken and was understood unanimously that they needed to reach out to the substitute soul reaper._ "Looks like we're going to finally meet, substitute soul reaper Ichigo Kurosaki." _Shinji smirked.

Shinji's memory dissipated, and he was staring at the warehouse ceiling again. He curled up in his blanket and sighed_. Why do I keep getting myself in situations like this? One minute I'm a captain, then a vizard, then a soul society refugee and then now I'm a fucking high school student. It won't be long now; I really should start to get ready for class before…."_

"AHH Hiyori I was just getting up honest, "Shrieked Shinji. Hiyori stood over him and she popped her knuckles as if she was preparing for the next hit.

"I'm getting ready to go to school and you pop me in the eye? How else I'm I suppose to be a good student." Shinji groaned as he held his right eye.

_"_Get up baldy! It's barely your first day and you're already failing to complete the mission!" Hiyori then grabbed Shinji by the collar, her eyes bulging with anger, as she shook him ferociously.

"You wanna talk about missions, let's talk about the mission to tame that morning mange you call pigtails. How's that working out for ya," Shinji shot back.

Hiyori gripping Shinji's collar banged his head against the love seat armrest, "Shut up! Shut up! I'm just not ready yet," whined Hiyori. Once Shinji's eyes refocused Hiyori threw the Karakura school uniform.

"Get Showered, and get dressed we can't afford to lose any time," ordered Hiyori. She walked away trying to fix her frizzed tresses in her red hair bands, obviously self conscious of how her hair was a wreck. It was time to start the day, what a bore. Shinji thought. He then gathered himself and got ready for school with a fresh grin on his face, and a school bag casually thrown over his shoulder.

"Ah, you must be the new transfer student Shinji Hirako," Beamed the slim brown haired woman with glasses. Shinji instantly recognized her as his homeroom teacher when he registered for classes.

"Why yes I am," Shinji responded smiling. Several Students brushed passed them and entered the classroom. He could already sense high spiritual pressures inside; this immediately took him by surprise. I barely just got here and I sense 5 unusually high spiritual pressures for humans anyways. Although I can sense one stronger than the other, it feels like steady flow of high spirit pressure just coming from one person.

"It was a pleasure to meet your father…umm Mr. Rose Hirako, was it?" Ms. Ochi strained to remember. Shinji rolled his eyes when he remembered Rose coming to the school with Shinji posing as his father to complete the paperwork. It was there that they met Ms. Ochi and the embarrassment of having Rose shamelessly flirt with the soon to be homeroom teacher , didn't seem to dissipate by her sudden amnesia of Rose's name, especially when he repeated his name and number to her every chance he got before they left.

Shinji paused as he attempted to peak passed shoulder into the classroom. He then spotted a group in the far corner, where he saw among them a kid with unruly spiked orange hair sitting casually in his chair. _Man, I can already tell that I don't like that guy. . Still I'm not quite sure if this is him or not I guess I still have to decipher that. Shinji internally groaned, there is nothing that can possibly make this experience less pleasant than it already is. _

"Good Morning !"A voice said approaching them, Shinji faced and turned and saw nameless angel, with smooth silky auburn hair, flawless china doll like skin, soft voluptuous curves, and a set of perfect over exaggerated breasts on a petite frame, she was the epitome of his image of perfection. Immediately Shinji's mind drifted to nasty sex fantasies of bending the girl on his knee and disciplining the girl for wearing such a tight school uniform in front of him and teasing him by the way she bounced from side to side when she said good morning. _Well, well maybe this won't be so bad after all_, Shinji thought smiling. His fantasies continued and ranged to different positions and places he would ravish her body, lost in his fantasies they abruptly ceased by Ms. Ochi's loud recognition of the girl's greeting.

"Oh good morning , glad to see you I expect that you had a good summer break and with your assignment also?" Asked the teacher, Shinji watched the girl carefully as she nodded.

"Yes Of course Ms. Ochi. I got it right here," Orihime pulled it out from her bag and smiled.

"Ah, I knew that I can count on you . This is exactly the one you want to shadow ; Inoe is one of our top students, "Chimed Ms. Ochi _. You ain't gotta tell me twice, _thought Shinji, as he eyed the young girl from head to toe.

"Ms. Inoe this is Shinji Hirako he's a transfer student from a neighboring school," explained the home room teacher. Orihime smiled in response and looked up at the blonde vizard._ That's odd, there's something different from her spiritual pressure. It's higher than a human, but only slightly…still it's different but I can't quite put my finger on it. _It truly perplexed the vizard, so much that he hardly noticed that the girl was staring right at him.

"Umm, It's a pleasure to meet you Shinji," Orihime squeaked. She could tell by the look on the strange blonde that his mind seemed elsewhere. "I never forget a face and I never forget a name. Unless I guess I wasn't paying attention…or if they never bothered telling me, which has happen to me before….," Orihime trailed off innocently.

_Well I better stop this, before she tells me her whole life story before I even get in the classroom, _Shinji cringed as he noticed that she was now getting into various incidents in which people forgot to tell their names to her. He then saw how incredibly naïve and innocent this girl was. This only made him want her even more, not many women now a day's exhibited these traits, well the type of women he usually hung out with anyways.

"Likewise beautiful, I look forward to getting to know you better. Do you tutor? Because I would love a tutor in chemistry if you'll have me." Shinji asked curiously.

Ms. Ochi obviously upset with the casual lack of formality that Shinji had for Orihime, repositioned her glasses in between her eyes, "Yes, well and Ishida are also excelling students in chemistry. I'm sure Ms. Inoe will be more than happy to add you to their group study sessions."

Orihime eyed thoughtfully blushing at Shinji, "Yeah, of course, the more the merrier."

_Forget the rest of those losers; I want a private study session with you. _"Yeah that sounds great."Shinji said trying to sound enthusiastic, but not even Orihime's beaming smile could make him sound happy about a group study with a bunch of bratty teens all fighting for her affections. _No Thanks, I'll just pass on that, _he thought.

The bell rang, and Orihime excused herself into the classroom where she closed the class door behind her. Shinji's eyes followed her as she took her seat. Interestingly enough, she didn't sit far from the student he suspected was Ichigo and this would work in his favor greatly. Not only could he work on his mission, but he would get the occasional eye candy of Miss Orihime. Shinji mentally noted his choice seat all he had to do is talk the teacher into that seat.

"I'm going to go in and introduce you to the class once I take roll, wait out here it shouldn't take me long," Ms Ochi told Shinji as she opened the classroom door and jetted inside.

Shinji rested his back against some lockers; inside his head he recited his pseudo back story to tell the class when asked. His boredom crashed, his senses sharpened, and his muscles stiffen that could mean only one thing, a hollow was nearby. I wonder if the substitute soul reaper will live up to his reputation. Only one way to find out, with that thought the blond vizard exited the building In search of a hollow with Ichigo Kurosaki's name with it.

Outside of the school Shinji stood on a telephone pole watching the hollow below thrash around, while casually drinking from his bottled water. The hollow was yelling something incoherent like pork or beef and was making so much noise. _Gawd I hate noisy people as if I didn't have enough nosiness on a daily basis …. When is Ichigo going to get here I've been sitting here for 10 minutes and I sensed this hollow 20 minutes ago, Urahara's right this kid sucks at sensing spiritual pressures. Oh well, if he doesn't get here soon I will just have to take this hollow out myself. That's what you get when you send a substitute soul reaper to do a vizard's job._ Shinji sighed impatiently, and as he took his first step off the telephone phone with his hand on his sword. He retracted as soon as he saw an orange haired soul reaper approach the scene. "About fucking time soul reaper," Shinji whispered to himself. Shinji watched upside down, masking his spiritual pressure so not to be noticed enjoying the show. The hollow wasn't much of a match for any Shinigami or vizard as a matter of fact, so when the soul reaper sliced through the hollow in one swing, Shinji merely chuckled. _Not that bad, although he lacked style. But if hacking_ _hollows carelessly while yelling obscenities your thing, I guess you can't argue with the results. _Shinji took a closer look and realized that it was the same orange haired kid he sensed with the high spiritual pressure back in the classroom. _Yeah, this must be him…but still. _Shinji wasn't too sure, he was one to gain all the facts then cautiously approach, it wasn't in his nature to be too impulsive, even if sometimes he broke against that mold as he saw fit. _Well, well seems like I'm not the only one that came to enjoy the show. _Below Shinji made out a huge muscular guy and a woman run towards the soul reaper as he finished the hollow, he lifted his newsboy cap and squinted. "Orihime," he wordlessly breathed. _ I knew that there was something different about that girl; it's going to drive me crazy until I can find out what it is. Not many humans can see hollows, much less soul reapers. More and more I'm starting to like this girl, I only hope that she's not dating anyone...Then again would I care? _Shinji tried to make out the dialogue below, but it was bits and pieces, plus the distraction of almost seeing up Orihime's skirt only made the voice below sound like distant gibberish. He watched Orihime carefully, as she conversed below. He figured that if she and the orange haired kid were dating that it would be implied, however he only heard her say the soul reaper's name.

"Yeah you're right Ichigo. Uryu will join us in time," Orihime worded hopefully.

The group started to dissipate and Shinji watched with a grin on his face, "Ichigo Kurosaki, Huh" _Guess my suspicions were right that was the kid alright. Urahara this is one hella of interesting substitute soul reaper. I still don't like him, but at least that I now know who is he and I can start trying to persuade him to join us. Who knows maybe he will start to grow on me._

Shinji just got to the classroom door, when Ms. Ochi opened it. "There you are Mr. Hirako I thought you had left."

"Yeah, sorry about that , bathroom break ya know," Shinji responded. For some reason or another she looked agitated or like she didn't believe him.

"Yeah, well apparently everyone's has bladder problems today. Well anyways, come on in Shinji it's time to introduce you to the class," motioned the door opened, and Shinji entered reluctantly.

"Class I'd like you to meet the new transfer student I told you about. Why don't you introduce yourself," Ms. Ochi waved Shinji to the middle of the top of class so he would be front in center. He could spot that coveted seat he wanted earlier, but then he spotted a seat right next to Orihime instead and his plans changed at the drop of a dime. Shinji turned around and piece of chalk and wrote down some characters to present the class.

"HEI as in HENHEISOUKU, KO as in ONAMEIMOKO, SHIN as in SHINSEKOUHAI, and KO as in KOMOSHIMENTAIKO makes: Shinji Hirako, a pleasure to meet you all," Shinji said as he bowed.

"Hey Shinji, it's spelled backwards!" Ms. Ochi said pointing to the board. The rest of the class giggled as Shinji caught the teacher off guard. Shinji saw Orihime among the students who smiled, he loved it when she smiled and her grey eyes lit up she looked so pretty and sexy.

"It's a real good trick isn't it? Backwards writing is a very unusual skill of mine," Beamed Shinji.

"Oh, how interesting, tell us Shinji more about you, your family, and your transfer over here," Ms. Ochi pressed.

"Well there's not much to say. I live with my 5 siblings including my younger sister whom I'm not particularly fond of." Shinji thought back to the beating that Hiyori gave him earlier that morning. "My single father and uncle Hachi moved here recently after my father got offered a job opportunity he couldn't refuse," Shinji said as he eyed Ichigo. "And presto I'm here."

"Ahh, very good, now where should we sit you," Ms. Ochi, thought aloud as she scanned the empty desks around the classroom.

"Oh, Ms. Ochi I'd like to sit next to a cute girl." Shinji answered, the whole class burst with laughter. He continued to eye the desk next to Orihime hoping Ms. Ochi would follow his cue.

"A cute girl…? Oh I don't know Mr. Hirako you may not concentrate on your studies with all those budding hormones." Ms. Ochi adjusted her glasses and spotted a desk next to some slumped over gloomy kid with glasses and straggly black straight hair covering his face. _No way am I going to sit with that four eye freak, even his spiritual pressure is off for a human._

"How about that desk over there, not only does it have the view of the window but could help me out if I'm falling behind." Shinji saw Orihime smile and blush, if this hint didn't give her the idea where he wanted to be sit nothing will.

"Hey no way..! I've been trying to get that desk forever, why does the new guy get it? Besides isn't it where Rukia sits," Keigo whined as he frantically flared his arm in protest.

A girl in short black hair hit Keigo in the back of the head with her notebook spiral," Stop being rude to the new transfer student! He can sit wherever he wants."

Keigo cried," Oww Tatsuki not fair! Not fair!" Shinji rolled his eyes; it was if he met the male version of Mashiro in Keigo.

"Alright settle down enough. And Keigo right, Ms. Kuchiki has fallen ill and won't be returning for a while as she recovers. So I'm afraid I can't sit you there you see, so I'm going to have to sit you over there," Ms. Ochi pointed the seat out to Shinji. It wasn't directly next to Orihime, but he still had a clear view of her and the seat was next to Ichigo, still Shinji wished he was sitting next to the mysterious naïve goddess he called his first love. Funny, how he forgets his mission with such a stunning beauty taunting his loins with each breath she took sitting two desks away. "Okay," Shinji agreed. The class was still in roaring in laughter and gossip when he took his seat next to Ichigo. He could tell he was deep in thought, and he took his seat willing to burst his concentration to break the ice.

"Looks like you and I are going to be neighbors yeah, I hope we can be friends Ichigo," Shinji said as he eased himself into the desk next to him. _Wonder what's on his mind, it's like he didn't noticed my spiritual pressure or even cared. He's Careless and reckless, not good at all. Guess I'm going to have to be more direct to make him understand I'm vizard._

"Oh, yeah sure thing," Ichigo responded his mind still on Uryu. Shinji grinned and chuckled to himself. _Soon Ichigo, you will know who I truly am soon enough._

Shinji shifted into his seat as he tried to listen to the lecture Ms. Ochi prepared, but he became utterly bored and listless. _Hopefully the bell will ring soon; I'm seriously going to fall asleep or die of boredom. _He noticed Orihime at the corner of his eye passing a note to the girl that hit Keigo earlier with her spiral notebook. She giggled and scribbled back on the pink notebook paper, she tried to pass it to her but the tiny piece of paper fell short by Shinji's foot. He looked around cautiously hoping that Orihime or the other girl noticed when he picked up the note and opened it. Relived that he could make out Orihime's responses by the purple ink and Tatsuki by the red ink he began to read ahead.

Tatsuki: "I think the new guy has the hots for you he won't stop staring at you. He's giving off some major stalker vibes."

Orihime: "Nah, I don't think he likes me we just met. Besides he's not that bad! He even wanted to join my study group with Ichigo, Uryu and Chad. I think he just needs friends since he's new. Besides did you notice his tongue ring?"

Tatsuki: "Yeah, and what's up with his hair?"

Orihime: "I don't know he looks sorta cute dontcha think? Besides the tongue ring doesn't look that bad on him either" (Heart, heart)

Shinji smiled, _oh the things I would do to you Orihime with this tongue ring. _Shinji continued to scroll down the crumpled paper.

Tatsuki: "Not really. He seems sorta weird. After all I thought Ichigo was more your taste in guys."

Orihime: "Yeah, but with Rukia gone he notices me even less because he's been so worried about her."

Tatsuki: "Are you and Ichigo still hanging after school?"

Orihime:" No Ichigo has other plans."

Tatsuki:" Sorry, so he blew you off again, huh?"

Orihime:" its fine really, he's dealing with a lot right now."

Tatsuki:" You're a horrible liar. Come and hang out with me after school if you want."

Reaching the end of the note, Shinji folded it up and inconspicuously threw it besides Tatsuki desk ._Man Ichigo is an idiot, how else can you describe a person who would turn that little sex kitten down. If it would have been me, I wouldn't have stood her up that's for damn sure. _The bell rang and all the students started to get up from their seats and walk out the door. Shinji reached in his pocket and took out the class schedule to figure out what he had next. Seems like chemistry, Shinji's least favorite subject. Orihime was the last one out along with Shinji. He seized the opportunity to flirt with Orihime while he could, and possibly dig for more information on Ichigo.


	3. Combustible Chemistry

"Orihime, do you mind telling me where chemistry 102 is?" Shinji asked innocently.

"Of course, it's down the hall third to the right. It's my next class so I will walk you there so you don't get lost," She said smiling. For several minutes they both walked side by side with a widening tension between them. Shinji's heart started to race when he leaned in slightly and the scent of Orihime's hair hit his nose. She smelled so good, like fresh peaches and strawberries, it took a lot self control from the Vizard to not pin the girl against the wall and passionately steal a kiss. But Shinji knew better, and he knew the best approach was slow, be persistent but slow. He certainly didn't want to scare her off just yet. Besides the thrill was the chase right?

"So you have practically become my unofficial school tour guide, and I don't know much about ya," Shinji said breaking the awkward silence.

"What do you wanna know," the auburn haired girl curiously asked. Shinji glanced over his hands casually in his pant pockets.

"Everything… But I guess can start by asking you if you're dating anyone." Shinji could tell what he just said make her uncomfortable, by the way her body tensed up and the way she averted her eyes from the vizard gaze.

"No, I've never really have had a boyfriend-so." Orihime then looked up at the blond who studied her carefully. Did she just make her pathetic love life seem abundantly obvious to a complete stranger? She winced at her choice of words.

"Well, me neither so I guess that's something we have in common huh? I've had girlfriends though, but that was a very long time ago," Shinji grinned widely hoping to bounce back from their awkward moment before. It seemed to work because Orihime was laughing and smiling. Even though Shinji never has had any interest in humans before he had to admit that this one was tugging at his heart strings. Whether it was strong lustful physical attraction, or that she was different from any human girl he ever encountered or simply the fact that she was so untainted and innocent, Shinji knew that he had to have her. The pair continued to walk together side by side when they arrived to the door of the chemistry class. To the naked eye it appeared that he let Orihime go in first out of some old fashion chivalry, but Shinji merely let her go first just to ogle her as walked in. As his eyes scanned every glorious inch of the unsuspecting girl's backside, he felt another pair of eyes burn judgmentally back at him when he stared back up. An icy glare from a pair of glasses hit the corner of his eye and a surge of steady other worldly spiritual pressure hit him. _It's that same four eye freak as before. Don't tell me that he just saw me stare her down just now. But so what if he did it's not like she even noticed still...I just don't like way he is looking at me. It's as if he knows I'm no ordinary student, this complicates things._ Shinji straighten up and walked in, both the Qunicy and the Vizard's eyes locked relentlessly as if both were engaged in a silent battle of the minds.

"Hey _Uryū did you finished last week assignment that Mr._ Miyagi gave out? It's worth a quarter of our grade," Orihime carelessly said. The Qunicy nodded, his eyes still locked defensibly at the vizard settling to sit next to her.

"Yeah I did. How about you, did you manage to finish the assignment with Rukia out?" Orihime forced a nod at what Uryu said, and looked down to the ground as her thoughts trailed off to her soul reaper friend. The young Quincy felt like eating his own words, he knew that Rukia and Orihime were close and with Rukia's recovery in the soul society from their last battle with the Bounts, the young girl worried excessively about her.

"Rukia is tough she will recover, and return back Hime," Uryu reassured. The vizard sat uncomfortably with a guilty and confused look on his face for listening to a private tender moment that he knew he wasn't supposed to have witness between them.

"Okay class assignments are due, and then I will assign partners for the next class project." The class groaned in unison at Mr. Miyagi's revelations for the rest of the class. The rest of the hour consisted of Shinji pretending to read along with the lecture, but in reality he just stared at Orihime and tried to shrug off the constant eye daggers of the Quincy behind him. If Shinji had his way, he would have dragged the black haired teen outside in the school parking lot and shot a cero point blank in the boy's chest, that indefinitely would have stop his glares, Shinji smirked at the thought of it. But the vizard knew that restraint is better than none and with so much was at stake he wasn't going to blow his cover just because some degenerate four eyes didn't like how he looked at Orihime. Shinji yawned, how he hated lectures, he thought of the captain meeting he used to attend, even those tedious meetings seemed more exhilarating than chemistry class. He stretched out lazily and flipped his spiral notebook to a blank page and began to scribble some sentences down on a piece of notebook paper. Once the teacher turned his back to the class, Shinji slid the note to Orihime.

Shinji: "Are you really getting any of this? Because I think if I listen anymore I will seriously be in comatose for the remainder of the school year." Orihime skimmed the note and silently giggled to herself while she wrote back .Shinji rocked back in his seat casually waiting for a response, tapping his fingers impatiently on his chemistry text book.

Orihime: "Yeah, Mr. Miyagi can be hard to follow sometimes. I will let you copy my notes if you want to. He gives out a lot of pop quizzes too so notes would help." Shinji's eyes scanned the note and he groaned…..pop quizzes? The very sound of it made him queasy; he decided to switch the subject instead.

Shinji: "So I can't help but tell your friend back there is giving me the evil eye." Orihime looked up confused and then looked over her shoulder to the dark haired Quincy in question.

Orihime: "Really I didn't even notice? Don't mind Uryu he's just protective of me, all of my friends are. Sorry, they tend to go overboard sometimes, especially Ichigo. It sometimes feel more of a burden to them when they do that than their friend." Maybe Shinji was reading too much between the lines, but he could sense the downhearted statement practically bleed through the paper. It was as if he got to glance a little into the girl's psyche, and he saw sadness and self loathing. Shinji's fists clenched into a ball, he couldn't understand it. Of course everyone wanted to protect her, even he did. She was kind, selfless, beautiful and intelligent, not to mention she lit up a room wherever she went, how she could possibly feel like she would be a burden to anyone. A couple of minutes passed, and the vizard sat silently in his chair staring at the piece of paper in front of him. His next statement was going to be bold, but Shinji felt obligated to convince the busty beauty of her worth.

Shinji: "Darling, I don't ever want to say that again. You are more valuable and precious than you will ever know; anyone that would ever think you're a burden is a fool, I've only known you a day and I can tell you that to me you could never be a burden." Shinji watched as she read the note to herself and noticed when she blushed and closed her eyes thoughtfully. In response to the letter Orihime adorned the letter with hearts.

Orihime: "Thank you Shinji," The vizard folded the notes and hid it under his arm as the teacher walked by their desks, then let out a sigh of relief. He didn't know what he would have done if the note were snatched up and read to the entire class; probably expire from post traumatic embarrassment he shuddered. The teacher now began to wind down and drone about chemical attractions, to which Shinji could vouch he was feeling right now, especially since he could feel the warmness of Orihime's spiritual pressure engulf him.

"Alright, since we have the basis of chemical compounds understood I am now going to divide you into groups of two." One by one students were paired, even the creepy four eyed freak got paired, Shinji was just happy he wasn't paired with him, knowing that he could have been chemistry partners with Ishida he was far from being picky.

"Well it seems like Ms. Kuchiki is ill and originally I paired her with you Ms. Inoe, so I'm going to pair you with the new student Mr. Hirako." Shinji could feel the looks of disproval from the other students but he just grinned in triumphant, _Eat you're fucking hearts outs. _

"Did you hear that Shinji, were going to be chemistry partners," gleamed Orihime, he nodded gazing into her eyes, his heart palpating louder in his chest as she met his intense stare.

"I couldn't ask for a better partner," the vizard complimented. Orihime started to arrange the set of beakers in front of them, placing one on the Bunsen burner. Shinji watched curiously although it would be a lie to say that Shinji knew what they were doing, the whole entire lecture seemed to go in one ear and out the other.

"So what are we doing love?" Shinji inched his chair forward closer to the young girl, testing the waters to see how she would react. Oddly enough she didn't seem to mind and was entirely relaxed, in fact she seemed dare he say; _Comfortable. _The thought alone was enough for Shinji; he even considered it a small victory on his quest to claim Orihime as his.

"Were mixing chemical compounds to see if they bond, ummm it's like…" Orihime tapped her finger thoughtfully against her chin finding the best lamest term she could think of. "Cooking, if you get the right ingredients and the right red bean paste you can make a lot of yummy dishes that you never thought went together."

"Or the natural chemical attraction between two lovers," Shinji rebutted, Orihime gasped when the blond vizard tenderly tugged a strand of her silky auburn hair twirled around his index finger, bringing her face closer to his.

"Ahem….Oh right that too," She timidly rasped as she pulled back from his grasp. Shinji laid his hand under his chin as he pondered whether or not he took it too far with his attempt to steal a kiss from her. _She seems too quiet and reserved now I wonder what was lurking in that pretty little head of hers. _A loud noise exploded in his right ear disrupting his train of thought; yes a loud ruckus of a noise….needless to say he hated noise. Shinji glanced over his shoulder and spotted the mismatched team of Ishida and a girl that was way out of his league, she was no Orihime but Shinji contemplated that if he was drunk enough she would be a good candidate for a good time.

"But Ishida, I still don't understand why you won't go to the Karakura School Dance with me," wined a plain brunette teen teamed with the Quincy. Uryu adjusted his slipping frame to the middle of his nose, his composure completely stoic.

"I've already explained that to you Fumika, I won't be going. I already have plans, Sorry." The girl looked down crushed and she nodded as if she fought to come to terms with the rejection just handed to her. Shinji scoffed, _what are ya gay? _The Quincy glared angrily at the vizard as if sending a message that his unwelcomed eavesdropping was not appreciated. Shinji frowned; _don't look at me if you brought this on yourself for making so much noise, you might as well invited the whole school to hear both of ya. _

Equipped with a new topic, Shinji decided to recover from his botched kiss and return to the real agenda at hand….flirting with Orihime and possibly seeing what he could dig up on Ichigo, however he leaned more towards the first part more than the second, she was by far more interesting than a substitute soul reaper. "So I hear that there's some snazzy school dance coming up. Are yer going?"

Taken by surprise Orihime fidgeted nervously and scratched the back of her head," You see…umm I was planning on going with Kurosaki…" Pain flushed across her face when she paused, "but some things came up, so I dunno if I am anymore."

_Great so the two bit substitute soul reaper not only dumped this gorgeous girl for a date but he dumped her for the school dance too? I mean, what does she SEE in this guy? Either he's a virgin or is completely socially inept and by the look of em' I wouldn't be surprised if it was both, _Shinji internalized. The very thought of some inexperienced dense teen completely oblivious to the advances of such an intoxicating bombshell made his stomach turn. _You don't deserve her Ichigo no way no how._ "So the carrot top, yer known him for a long time?" Shinji drilled.

"Ever since I can remember…. We go way back," she answered cheerfully as she measured chemicals into the beaker. "I think...It needs more of this pink stuff," she told herself pouring the mixture to the remaining stew.

Somehow Shinji's intuition told him that the bubbling concoction brewing in front of him wasn't stable; call it the increased bubbling or the fact that the color was bright neon yellow, either way he started to feel weary about the chemistry experiment.

"Yea' ya don't say. So what is this guy's deal anyways did he change plans or something when he asked you to the school dance?" Shinji wanted to word it a lot more severely, but he figured that this way was a lot nicer since it was painfully obvious that she liked Ichigo.

"Well, not exactly, you see…I was going to ask him but with our friend recently injured, he's been so worried about her, that he mainly sticks to himself." Orihime said despairingly as she stirred the elixir on the burner.

"Sounds to me like he likes this other girl more than he willing to admit, I mean why else would he not go to the dance with you even if this one girl is injured, it's not like he can't dance and worry at the same time, right?" Shinji replied bluntly, escaping a dry sarcastic laugh.

Orihime felt like shrinking, she brought herself to eye level with the beaker, her melancholy eyes staring back at the vizard through the glass. She couldn't argue with the blond, she had noticed for several months that the relationship between Ichigo and Rukia progressively intensified. Envy spread through Orihime's chest, she had loved Ichigo for a while but always suppressed her feeling because Ichigo was so withdrawn since the death of his mother, and here came Rukia…Orihime's complete opposite and she single handedly breathed life back into the orange haired teen. Secretly Orihime wished it were her that made Ichigo the great man he is now but she was weaker in comparison to the black haired Shinigami, and yet since Rukia's stay in the world of the living she had became the sister that Orihime never had, she loved both Ichigo and Rukia so why did these feelings plague her? _It's selfish of me to want him all to myself, when I'm not as strong as him or Rukia; _the teen girl belittled herself internally.

"Listen, darlin'…. what I meant to say is-"Shinji's body tensed and he stopped speaking at mid sentence. Orihime reacted oddly not sure what to make about his reaction when she looked back at him, unfortunately she wouldn't have time to because the vizard jumped out of his seat and tackled the unsuspecting gray eyed teen to the floor landing a few feet from their desk. The entire class yelled and shrieked when there was a small blast from Shinji's and Orihime's chemistry project. Luckily, no one was hurt but the ceiling above however, appeared to have suffered the most damage with some form of erosion when the experiment shot up from the explosion. Several coughing and groans from the rest of the students followed shortly after the class filled with smoke and thick scent burnt ceiling tile.

Huffing from the smoke, feet away from ground zero, the vizard was still lying on top of his school crush still shielding her from the floating debris of the explosion. Shinji looked down panicked; he tried to tone down his strength when he grabbed her to not have crushed her on impact, but her closed eyes and dream like expression told him otherwise, and he had feared the worst. He leaned in closer and felt her warm breath down his neck, he sighed relief to know that she was still breathing. Orihime breathed unevenly her body lax against Shinji creating a snug heat between them. The vizard meditatively closed his eyes and pressed his body into her, bringing her up into his lap and cradling her. Even though the whole class smelt burnt, the girl's scent still overwhelmed Shinji's senses and he began to felt his lower body on fire, he knew it wasn't the right time or hardly the right place, but it didn't help it when the girl's soft curves melted so perfectly onto his body. "Darlin' yer awake," Shinji gently cooed as he brushed her hair away from her face.

Orihime blinked several times, her vision blurred and jumpy."Ichigo," She questioned still unable to make out a face. Shinji flinched at the sound of the substitute soul reaper's name, a knot formed in his throat he gulped the bitter taste of jealousy and anger down his burning throat. The vizard scoffed his eyes squinted in annoyance; _Forget my name so easily at the thought of yer savior huh. I should have done what Rose did, shamelessly throw out my name and number every chance I did….maybe then she would have remembered my name._

In Shinji's arms, Orihime's vision refocused on blond straight strains of hair hovering over her, she sat up and blushed in embarrassment when she realized how close her body was to the new transfer student. The vizard looked back at conscious teen girl, unsuccessful at hiding his irritation with the fact that he just saved the girl of his dreams and she just mistaken him for a 16 year old substitute soul reaper virgin. In response Orihime covered her eyes mortified, this was too much to bare…not only did she almost kill the entire class with her failed chemistry experiment, but she just called a cute guy she liked by the name of her unrequited love._ Please, just kill me now, _Orihime thought to herself still blushing.

Mr. Miyagi appeared from the smoke flustered while he grabbed his handkerchief and wiped off the dark gray debris from his glasses. "Is everybody fine?" Several students moaned yes in response. The middle aged teacher brushed off his suit or remainder of, and spotted the culprit still in the new student's arms. "Miss Inoe, where did you think we went wrong in that experiment? Would you care to elaborate to the rest of the class that's alive? "

Orihime laughed nervously, "Ummmm…too much pink stuff?" Before the befuddled teacher could even respond, the bell rang and the charred teacher and students began to exit, emptying the smoldering classroom.

"A little help," Shinji asked the bewildered human girl as he helped her up, even catching her when she temporarily lost balance.

"I-"The vizard abruptly cut the naive teenager off, placing his finger against her pink glossy pressed lips. There were a million things he wanted to say to her, fifty percent of it ended in kissing her and the other fifty percent ended on calling Kurosaki every foul thing in the history of language.

"Hush, you don't have to say anything beautiful, just the fact that your okay is good enough for me," Shinji affirmed. Silence was the young girl's answer and the natural barrier that began to separate them, and with that the vizard slowly let go of her hand. The blond former captain of the 5th division observed his new found love slip away past the door, his eyes catching hers when she peered over her shoulder back at him still speechless. _Orihime ever since our eyes met, your fated is sealed…your mine. I will make you forget all about that soul reaper's name until you can only remember mine._

Rustling in his pocket Shinji dusted off favorite newsboy cap and placed in his head, he couldn't explain his sudden onset of uneasiness that swelled over him and he was unsure if it was the remainder of being served his heart on a silver platter by the beautiful girl he pinned for, or if it was something else that stirred heavily in the air, either way Shinji's senses were on high alert. Instinctively, the blond looked around trying to find a reason to be more cautious, but with none he lazily strolled out of the classroom and through the hall to the school exit. After all, the vizard had enough excitement for one day, plus neither of his next classes had Ichigo or Orihime so he thought he would call it a day and play hooky for the rest of the undesirable classes left on his schedule.

"What? Leaving so soon," The Quincy inquired as he drew his bow back letting an arrow shoot directly at the ambushed vizard.


	4. Vizard Ceros and Quincy Arrows

Reacting quickly as usual, Shinji retracted and ducked, his beloved hat cushioned the arrow when it landed on the side of the building where he stood. The irritation on Shinji's face was apparent as he saw his impaled hat hanging from the bow that pierced it.

"Hey…that was my favorite hat," the vizard angrily growled at the Quincy, still drawing back another arrow.

"Sorry, I was aiming for your head, but you managed to dodge my attack so easily. Tell me, are you a soul reaper?"

"Do I look like I am?" Shinji backhandedly retorted as if it was deafeningly obvious he wasn't.

"Then why is your spiritual pressure like Kurosaki's?" Uryu interjected, shooting another arrow at the former soul reaper, who dodged his enraged shot again so coolly.

Shinji looked down at his ruined new tie, now sliced horizontally from the young Quincy. " Arggh…if every time you shoot an arrow you ruin another piece of my wardrobe, I'm just going to end up going home with no clothes...And trust me neither one of us wants that," he groaned.

"You're ignoring my question, and testing my patience..." Uryu reprimanded harshly drawing more spiritual pressure from the air, creating a new arrow. "Now you're here for a reason that much is abundantly clear, but it has to do with Orihime isn't. Who are you really," calmly worded the speckled Quincy archer.

"Hmph...So that explains it. Sorry Quincy, your wrong, my target isn't Orihime Inoe, but she is quite a catch isn't she…that's why you're so hell bent on fighting me…right? What is it, your old fashioned sense of Quincy pride that has you protecting the honor of the damsel in distress? Or is it the fact that deep down you'd wish it was you lying on top of her instead of me?" Shinji spat emotionally detached, a deadpan expression of seriousness swept across Shinji's face as he got the stunned reaction on the Quincy's face just as he anticipated.

"You bastard you keep your filthy hands off of her," Uryu responded through clenched teeth and narrowed eyes. The vizards words scorched through Uryu like coursing venom, usually he was the one that was the composed in battle, but with an opponent that read right through him like an open book it was harder to interrogate him than it was to simply kill him. "I know what you're trying to do Hirako; you're trying to rattle me, but I'm not going to let you get the best of me anymore. Now….you just said that your target wasn't Inoe, and then who is it! Is it…..Kurosaki?"

Shinji widely grinned, mocking the raven haired teen. "Boy you sure are nosey for a Quincy, kinda reminds me why the soul society exterminated all of em' in first place." Spiritual particles started to form around the vizard as he placed his right hand over his right eye, Uryu watched dumbfound when a hollow mask and zanpakutō materialized on Shinji.

"Wait-That mask!" Uryu exclaimed flabbergasted, his left hand curled in a fist. A swirl of florescent red gathered around Shinji's zanpakutō and a cero ripped through the atmosphere when he released it, making the experienced Qunicy counter it with his own arrow to reduce the impact. Falling backwards, Uryu caught his balance bouncing himself back up, now surrounded by dust and smoke, he coughed into his right blood soaked school uniform shirt sleeve. Mentally, the Quincy strategized his next move as the dust clouds slowly dissipated apart, the last cero the vizard shot created a crack in the Quincy bangle that Uryu replicated from his last one from his battle in the soul society. However, at this continuing rate he fought on, the bangle would surely disintegrate, leaving him completely vulnerable to another attack.

Blood trickled down the Quincy's clothes from his injured arm; his blonde opponent glanced back at him with listless vacant eyes as if he had completely checked out from boredom. The vizard let out a huge sigh and he looked down, burying his hands in his pocket, this game was getting tiresome and he just hated the idea of killing his intended recruit's friends, doing so would only further push Ichigo away, and that was not an option with the Hōgyoku so close to awakening.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say that you're holding back Hirako." Uryu pointed out, his face glowering in suspicion.

"Funny, I was just gonna to say the same about you. And by the look on ya cracked bangle ...I'd say I'm bout right," The former Shinigami captain collectedly ___exasperated_, drawing another cero from his sword.

Recognizing the blast just used on him, the raven haired teen retreated back, Ishida furiously growled and let go of his waiting arrow first, hoping to catch his classmate off guard before he could counter attack. Uryu fell back; anticipating his maneuver worked but when the young Qunicy inspected the shot of his arrow, a flash of sonido scurried across the empty back school lot and stopped strategically in front of the standing unmoved blond vizard. Swinging their sword, the unknown ___silhouette_ batted the high intensity Qunicy arrow into the air with ease, blasting it off into the straddle field like a home run ball at the World Series. When the figure stood still, a girl with a school outfit and two long black braided pigtails appeared holding out her sword in a threatening stance.

"Yer swing hasn't improved since the last time we played Lisa, "Shinji side handily commented. The braided female vizard glared forward to the Qunicy in silent defiance, saying nothing to her comrade behind her; she figured she would give him a piece of her mind about her baseball skills later, once she and Shinji got back to the warehouse.

"So the rumors are true, you are a Quincy. I just had to come and see it for myself since It's been a while since I've actually seen one alive, or seen another Qunicy bangle for that matter," Lisa remarked surprised, adjusting her glasses with one hand.

"It's interesting you both know who I am and yet you say you're not Shinigami; I'm not sure what you are or how you know so much about Quincys or even why your spiritual pressures likes Kurosaki's, but there's one thing that's certain…I'm not letting you go until I have some answers," Ishida firmly stated.

Lisa's eyebrows furrowed and then her left eyebrow rose in annoyance. "Listen kid, you're way outta of your league... up to this point, Shinji has been just toying with you because he knows that you don't have your full Qunicy powers; just imagine how dead you would be right now if he was actually serious. Even those practice shots he blasted at you weren't at full strength and he still managed to injure you."

Both vizards watched as the Quincy's pupils shirked in disbelief. "Those were Practice shots," Uryu questioned to himself out loud.

Lisa stepped forward taking small steps towards the wounded Quincy leaving Shinji concerned to her intentions when spiritual particles formed at the base of Lisa's face forming an oval hollow mask. The blond vizard observed her with astute curiosity and a keen sense of caution, ready to retract his sword if needed if either party took it too far. Uryu stood firm in his posture holding his glowing arrow out with unwavering animosity as the unknown vizard woman came closer to him, he winced unsure what to expect. Before the Qunicy retracted his final bow, his braided pigtailed opponent's figure blurred and sped off with incredible speed, leaving Uryu with little time to dodge when her kick sent him flying backwards and landing on his wounded arm and disintegrating Qunicy bangle.

"Your bangle has completely destroyed now, and you have no means in defending yourself left, so why not just hear out what I gotta to say." Lisa paused searching for a glimmer of protest in the young boy's eyes, but when she saw he was all ears, she didn't hesitate to continue. "Your right about our spiritual pressures being like Kurosaki's, and if you can sense that I'm sure you can sense that it has been heavier and darker than before, just like…"

"A hollow," Uryu finished the serious vizard's sentence. The Qunicy had suspected a minuscule trace of hollow pressure in Ichigo back in the soul society when they took on the captain court squads, but it wasn't until recently he noticed it was more erratic and more overwhelming than before. Many instances flashed over Uryu's memories where he wanted to confront his unlikely friend, but he always retreated back when the orange haired soul reaper forced a smile on face and reassure the Quincy that he was fine, even if Uryu knew otherwise. Now faced with two adversaries donning the same spiritual pressures, Uryu argued with himself whether he had made the right decision not being more direct with the substitute soul reaper.

"So you understand, right? Sooner or later the friend that you know will slowly be eaten alive by his inner hollow and then he will start killing everyone around him, including you. Like it or not we're the only thing standing in the way of that happening. You can accept that and let us go, or I'll show you what I really can do. I promise you I won't hold back like Shinji did," Lisa threatened hovering over Uryu.

Wind circled around the vizards and the Quincy and an eerie silence that thickened the air with tension fell upon them with intense glare they gave each other, as each one of waited for someone to make the first move. When several painstaking minutes passed and no one initiated another fight, Lisa pulled her sword into her sheath, satisfied that she had proven her point. The Qunicy following her lead stumbled pulling himself up to stand, and clenched his wounded arm as he watched the vizards prepared to depart.

"You're the smart out of the group, so I know that you won't say anything because you're afraid for him, and you're afraid for good reason… because you know I'm right." Lisa hissed, both vizards began to blur in front of the Quincy's vision and then disappeared at the blink of an eye.

The Qunicy took a handkerchief from his back pocket and tied it around his wounded arm in attempt to clot the bleeding. "Ichigo what have you gotten yourself into to?" Uryu murmured under his labored breathing. Questions and escalating fears swirled in Uryu's head; the scarce answers he received from the masked strangers hardly was enough to quench the surface of what he really wanted to know. It's true that when it came to the soul reaper and the Quincy that their friendship was a mirage of complexities, both at first hated each other, but with the act of fighting along each other's side for so long, they bonded forming a mutual understanding, so much that they relayed on each other often. But with the new sudden onset news spilled onto his lap, his reliability seemed shot. How could the former Shinigami enemy, possibly help Ichigo through this, when was now powerless with no Qunicy bangle? No this was beyond the young Quincy and his current abilities, yet could he trust the Shinigami with the hollow masks, he frowned answering his own question. Uryu clenched his fists in anger, _how could I be so impulsive and charge into this scrimmage without a clearer head, I might as well be Kurosaki! Now I know I'm worried if I'm willing to admit that Ichigo is starting to rub off on me, _the Quincy shrugged off.

"Uryu," a voice cried out. Her face looked concerned and stern as if she could charge at the Quincy assailant in her protectiveness. The Qunicy turned, and his thought regained consciousness to why he reacted so strongly against the blond vizard to begin with, it was all about her. It was all crystal clear to him now.

"Orihime...What are you doing," Uryu blurted out, a heavy hand landed on his shoulder and interrupted his sentence, he instantly recognized it to be Chad.

"We felt your spiritual pressure flare up as if you were fighting so we came out to see if you were okay. What happened?" Chad questioned.

Ishida froze; he didn't know where to start even if he wanted to tell the truth of what really happened. Orihime looked up with him with worried eyes when she spotted blood on the Qunicy school uniform sleeve.

"It was nothing to worry about, just a hollow, It's gone now...I took care of it." Uryu lied. The Quincy sensed that none of his friends believed him, but he didn't care. The important part was that the masked strangers were gone, and even if he took the brunt of their strength, he was relieved that his friends weren't confronting them, especially when they were much stronger than any foe they have encountered so far.

"So you went off on your own...What were you thinking? You should have just waited for me, I could have taken it out in one swing," bellowed Ichigo arrogantly as he arrived joining the group behind the school exit.

"I said it was nothing, a weak hollow not worth so much reinforcement," Ishida replied calmly. Ichigo scratched the back of his head hesitantly, not sure if he should bring up how everyone knew about the Quincy's powers being fairly diminished or how for the past couple of days he worried about the Quincy archer. Instead the substitute Shinigami decided to take his word for it, and skip the touchy feely stuff…after all he was never good at expressing those kinds of feelings directly to his friends.

"Yeah okay, but did you have to go and get yourself hurt?" Ichigo taunted, a nerve bulged out of the Quincy's forehead in anger.

"Well if you weren't so bad at detecting spiritual pressures, you wouldn't have been so slow to get here," Argued the Quincy back.

"Me...Slow?" Ichigo responded stunned, his eye twitched in irritation.

"Okay, guys…" Orihime flared her arms around trying to separate the feuding teen boys, she laughed nervously since she knew that if she didn't interfere soon that these two could argue back and forth for hours on end.

"Umm…are you okay Uryu…your arm," Orihime grimaced at the Quincy as if she could feel the wound on her own arm. The Quincy felt uncomfortable under all the scrutinizing stares of his friends, since usually he was on the other side of that stare when either one of his friends were lying to him.

"Thank you for your concerns, but I'm fine." Ishida countered.

"Then we should head back to class. The bell is about to ring and when Ms. Ochi realizes that we're gone again she'll make us do another extra credit assignment," groaned Ichigo.

Chad and Ichigo started to head into the school, when they realized that Uryu and Orihime stayed behind, the both glanced over their shoulder.

"Hey are you coming?" Ichigo shouted at the pair.

Orihime waved her arm back to the two burly boys, "Yeah! Go on ahead I'm going to heal Uryu first." The orange haired soul reaper smiled back at her, and she blushed shortly after returning his smile. Chad nudged the dazed substitute soul reaper back to reality, and they both retreated in the school building, their loud chatter faded into the background.

"Hime, its fine you don't-" Orihime gently cupped his injured arm inspecting the bloodied wound, cutting off Uryu off mid sentence.

"Uryu you're hurt," the endowed girl pleaded. Uryu silently nodded in agreement, and a warm smile spread across her face. The Quincy knew that turning her down was not an option, not when healing her loved ones gave her so much piece of mind.

"Soten Kisshun," the young healer summoned in a soft whisper, the shield covered Uryu's arm like a blanket radiating heat throughout his entire wound. The girl's face was rigid in concentration, and under the light of her shield she seemed 10 years older and even three times more enchanting to the Quincy.

"There all better," Inoe chimed, her hairclips returned to full dormant state once Ishida's wound healed to full flesh, making the handkerchief around the Quincy's arm fall to the ground. Orihime glowed in personal success in her work when she saw the deep gash in the Quincy's arm was gone, but she bit her bottom lip when she noticed her friend's harden face lost in thought.

"Something wrong Uryu?" The auburn haired girl prodded, hoping that he would confess the truth about his arm.

"No. But thank you for healing my arm," Ishida appreciatively conveyed, still masking the truth from his prying classmate.

"Uryu can I ask something, was Shinji out here with you? Is he…alright?" Her eyes flickered dim as if she was waiting for bad news.

The Qunicy wanted to roll his eyes, _of course that idiot was fine…he was the one that managed to escape the fight without a scratch_.

"You sensed his spiritual pressure even if he's gone, Didn't you?" The Quincy drew from her question.

"His Reiatsu is so strong; it reminds me a lot of Ichigo's. So when I sensed his spiritual pressure outside with yours, I didn't know what to expect..." She answered, stroking her long auburn locks through her slender fingers.

"He's fine...He got away," Ishida monotonously replied, tweaking the white lie from the actual event.

The human girl's eyes closed in reaction, escaping a held back sigh from her pressed lips, "That's a relief… but why is Shinji's hat stuck to the side of the building?" The curiosity in her voice, outmatched the confusion written on her porcelain face.

"I missed," Uryu confessed as Inoe took down the dangling vizard hat from the Quincy arrow plunged into the school back building.

"I'm sure he's been looking everywhere for it, I really should return it to him. It's the least I can do after he saved me from our Chemistry project." Orihime vowed aloud, clutching the newsboy hat to ample chest.

Ishida sneered from the displeasure of the idea, "It's getting late, we really should head back; we don't want to worry the others," The Quincy said inching towards the school building. The girl cheerfully nodded, trailing a few steps behind her raven haired classmate, confidant of returning the hat to the rightful blond owner.


	5. An Ode To The Disaster Prone

"_Home sweet home_, yeah right….the idiot that said that didn't obviously live with the likes of Hiyori", the blond thought aloud. Lisa looked less than amused at Shinji's comment, rubbing her temples in attempt to soothe her headache from the former captain's latest stupidity.

"How mad is she?" Shinji asked wearily. Doom sunk in when Lisa didn't immediately answer, which only meant that the short tempered pigtailed horror was beyond the realm of livid. Now the vizard had wished he was still fighting the Quincy that would have been safer than the beating that waited for him on the other side of the door.

"Remember the time you ditched her on her birthday to get your tongue pierced to impress some bimbo, and she cut off your hair and destroyed all your records? About the same," Lisa answered.

"Shit," the blond vizard cursed. How could he forget? It took over 10 years for Shinji to grow his golden locks passed his waist in the soul society, and in one raged fueled night Hiyori snipped it all too uneven hell. Even with the dismay of waking up the next morning with the gruesome discovery of his hacked hair, it wasn't more of low blow than finding his beloved jazz records sprinkled across his bedroom floor like confetti. Ever since then he kept his hair short, his jazz records hidden, and always tried his best to avoid the youngest vizard when she was in destruction mode, which unfortunately for him was more often than most. Shinji's hand ran through his hair and over his face in anguish at the thought of it. Lisa in turn, rolled her eyes as if she could already foresee the incoming assault from Hiyori already.

"Why did you have to fight the Quincy anyways, you only brought it on yourself by shooting your damn cero, how the hell could we ignore that." Lisa jeered.

"Che, yer one to talk Lisa you might as well ran up to Kurosaki like yer did the four eyes and just tell em' our entire plan," Shinji scoffed in argument.

"Well, I didn't see you come up with any brilliant ideas there Einstein, when I got there you were already masked and shooting ceros, you almost killed that fucking Quincy…I had to DO something. Besides I don't know why you're so upset anyways, the Quincy isn't going to say anything and if Hiyori or Kensei had gone in my place instead of me…your mission would have been compromised anyway, I doubt either one of them would have left him alive," Lisa snarled.

Shinji couldn't argue back, he felt like biting his own tongue at the fact that she was right, and he loathed it with a passion. Huffing out a couple of yeah you're right sigh, Hirako unwillingly surrendered to the speckled porn enthusiast.

"You never answered why you were fighting the Quincy to begin with," Lisa sternly reminded him; she folded her arms across her chest and tapped her foot impatiently as the blond vizard drew a blank across his face.

The tongue pierced vizard shuffled in his head for a more feasible explanation that didn't mention Orihime, the last thing he needed was to rile up unwanted suspicion and monitoring of the poor girl, not when his conquest of her wasn't nearly complete. "Must be jealous of my dashing good looks and irresistible charm," He sheepishly grinned.

"HA…Shinji we dated for 2 years and I can honestly tell you it wasn't because that," Lisa clarified.

If it was something she hated the most about Shinji it would have to be the way he always managed to flip everything upside down. He inverted everything even the truth if he wanted to, which was clearly the case with the Quincy to her. His infamous inverted truths were one of Lisa's greatest pet peeves among a long list of others when it came to her ex, he was just too cunning for his own good, and the bastard knew that.

"That reminds me Darlin' why did we break up again," Hirako purposely instigated, successfully shifting the subject off him. Why Lisa always fell in the same trap, was beyond the blond vizard, but it worked every single time when dodging an unpleasant interrogation from her.

Nostrils flared with burning fire as Lisa's buttons were finally pressed beyond her breaking point, her teeth grinned so loudly that it was surprise that none of her teeth fell out of her gums."Because you called me old… criticized my baseball swing and the way I dress…..You Dumbass!" She fumed resentfully at the top of her lungs.

Shinji shook his head argumentatively, "No, that wasn't it. If I remember correctly it was because yer were getting' fat. I just didn't say it before because you only eat more when yer upset and now that wouldn't have helped...Wouldn't it?" Shinji stuck his tongue out immaturely, sporting his sliver tongue ring after his damaging taunt, yet another annoying pet peeve of Lisa's.

"That's it! You're DEAD SHINJI!" The former lieutenant furiously shrieked before violently hook kicking the blond vizard missile through the factory door, knocking it clear off the hinges.

Shinji moaned loudly in crimpling pain when he landed back first into the factory entrance, hardly conscious with dancing stars orbiting the giant whelp on the top of his head. "Should I go towards light or away," he dryly strained out.

"Away you idiot, I'm still nowhere near done with you," Lisa answered back, stomping repetitively on the vizards back. Shinji rolled back and forth protecting his sobbing face, unaware that Hiyori had awaken from her early evening nap from all the ruckus he was causing downstairs. The young sandaled vizard made her way towards Shinji and Lisa, looming over them with a snaggle tooth fanged scowl.

"You're really a disgrace you know that! Here I am waiting for you to recruit the carrot top kid, and you're here taking a nap, while Lisa massages yer back." Hiyori barked grabbing a fistful of Shinji's golden mange, pulling him up to his feet. He frowned in disbelief, wiping off the excess blood dripping from the top of his head from his redden face.

"Whaaa-Are ya blind or just stupid, Lisa wasn't massaging me she was killing me!" The blond vizard choked out victimized.

"What did you just call me?" Hiyori's face squinted sourly, balling up her fist to the beaten vizard's chin.

Shinji nervously gulped, regrettably aware of his grave mistake, "Hiyori-AHHHHH"

___________________**CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP,CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP, CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP, CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP, CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP, CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP, CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP, CRUNCH, THUD**  
_

Down below in the basement turned training ground of the vizard base, Kensei attempted to gouge Mashiro with his Tachikaze, but the green haired girl giggled and swiftly managed to move just in time to dodge it.

"Ha Ha silly Kensei, you're going to have to be faster than that if you wanna catch me you slowpoke," Mashiro taunted making a childish face.

"Shut up! And pay attention, if this was a real battle you would be dead by now!" Kensei wrapped his arm around the young vizard's neck while she was distracted from gloating rendering Mashiro frozen in his grip. After a serious pause Kensei loosen his grip and she pouted in return. "See, that's one of your greatest weaknesses Mashiro you distract too easily, leaving yourself wide open."

A suspicious devilish grin spread on Mashiro's lips. "You're right Kensei; you shouldn't leave yourself WIDE open." Confusion paralyzed the gray hair vizard's face at Mashiro's response….soon realizing what she meant, when she back kicked Kensei bull eyes in the groin.

"You little-," Kensei rasped keeling over in excruciating pain.

"Damn, Rose you were right…again," sighed Love. Rose smiled and extended his hand, and Love unreluctantly surrendered a handful of money into his palm.

"Mashiro always ultimately gets Kensei the same way…you would think he'd start wearing a cup," Rose commented squeamishly.

"Old habits do die hard," Hachi added wisely. The three vizard spectators nodded in agreement, watching Mashiro's victory dance over Kensei for the 120th time.

**CRUNCH, THUD, SLAP….THUD! "STOP CRYIN' BALDY!"**____________________________________________

Every vizard in the underground training base cocked their head in the direction of the loud noise above, all of them too thoroughly aware whose high pitched squeals of pain and who's the screeching threat belonged to.

"Well, sounds like Shinji's home…I'm sure Hiyori belted him good for fighting the Quincy with his cero." Rose deduced.

"Yeah, I bet it's all sorts of ugly up there. Hiyori was pretty pissed when she felt Shinji's cero shoot; I mean…Urahara did tell us that the boy had a Quincy as a friend. I just didn't think Shinji would resort to going that far." Love collected thought aloud, both Hachi and Rose peered back at him as if they shared the same stirring suspicions.

"Well I for one am curious to hear about the substitute soul reaper Shinji is trying to recruit, so we should really stop the fight above, before he's too injured to tell us," Hachi offered peacefully. One by one the remaining vizards dusted themselves off and left the training ground and towards upstairs, little did they know of the chaos they were stepping into when they surfaced in the central living room.

"When is it going to stop," sobbed Shinji. His empty pleas fell on deaf ears when Lisa and Hiyori started working each of his kidneys on each side.

"Ok that's enough," Kensei's roar rippled through the warehouse like crashing wave, making everyone in its radius to stop in their tracks. Whether it was pity of seeing Shinji being mercilessly beaten up by two malicious girls and sympathized, or simply the fact that minutes ago he was at the mercy of Mashiro and still felt raw bout it for the 120th time, Kensei either way managed to dismember the insidious fight with a single utterance. Gasping for air, Shinji wondered what the fuck him so long.

"Well….Did you find him?" Kensei asked. Shinji managed to drop his aching broken body on the vizard recliner, grinning widely despite being knocked practically unconscious by two furious vizards just seconds ago.

"Yea' I found yer brat," the blond vizard reassured everyone.

"Well?" Love pressed on, he couldn't help being more curious with Shinji's quick abrupt answers.

"Urahara's right, the carrot top is some freak of nature...his spiritual pressure is through the roof, but he's young and doesn't suppress it well. If his hollow exhibits anything of that, I think we may be getting into more than we've bargained for." He paused, catching the mixed facial expressions of his colleagues, some were curious while others seemed weary or just plain uninterested. The blonde vizard continued, now with a contemplative seriousness in his tone, "But I could sense the hollow spilling' in his reiatsu, which only mean it's a matter of time before the damn thing starts clawing outta him and devourin' him alive."

"Wow," Mashiro gasped astonished at his graphic description, the others either furrowed their eyebrows in concerned or averted their gazes deep in thought, Shinji however stretched in the recliner lazily and grinned widely again, the very sight made Hiyori bubble with annoyance.

"And what the fuck are you smilin' about dipstick?" Hiyori demanded.

"Everyone looks so fucking serious, I'm sure the boy will come…in due time. Let him enjoy what little shreds of sanity he has left," Shinji confidently answered.

"Big talk for someone who on the first day got into it with a Quincy and didn't bring the soul reaper back as ordered," Hiyori irritably nitpicked.

"Che shows how much you know...Ya pipsqueak," Even if Shinji jabbed back in a barely inaudible voice, the blond pigtailed horror still overheard and viciously hocked her sandal in his face.

Rose disapprovingly shook his head, voicing what the entire vizard pack was universally thinking. "Honestly Hiyori…don't you ever give it a rest?"

A chuckle escaped from the red recliner carrying Hiyori's bold antagonizer, "Ahh leave her alone….can't ya see it's the girl's way of saying she's in love with me," the jazz lover shamelessly poked.

"Humph you wish Baldy," Hiyori's freckled snarl tried to hide her blushing face, but it was far too late by the time her accused crush had snuck up behind her and covered her running mouth.

"Shinji you Assho-" Hiyori's shorten muffled screams vibrated through the room, and the feisty young girl kicked and thrashed in opposition of having Shinji forcibly lift her tiny body over his shoulder like a school book bag.

"Relax munchkin," Shinji voiced overhead to his childish captive, "If ya keeping squirming like a little worm I just might end up droppin' ya."

"You drop me, and I swear I'll fucking kill you," Hiyori alerted back. The blond vizard only grinned widely, ignoring her empty threats as he casually carried the volatile cargo of a girl towards his room.

"Please close the door, we've seen enough of you two lovebirds tonight," Lisa urged, observing the whole comical sight.

Her tongue pierced ex rolled his eyes in irritation at Lisa's sexual suggestion. _The nerve she would even assume the most perverted from him when it came to the likes of Hiyori…I mean maybe with Orihime…or some other heavenly bodied woman..But with Hiyori…No she was a whole other story; she was just a girl, an annoying one at that, but still a little girl,_ the vizard internally voiced.

The office door slammed behind the two briskly, and Shinji dropped all 57 pounds of sandaled furry on top his small clot at the corner of his room, he would follow shortly, elbowing Hiyori to move more toward the wall so he could squeeze in more comfortably next to her.

"I really hate you, ya know that," the freckled preteen broke out.

"Yea, Yea, tell me sumpthin' I didn't know," Shinji replied in a stretched yawn. Hiyori pulled herself closer to Shinji and curled next to his arm in comfort, the contact of her smooth cold skin on the former captain made him shiver at the touch.

"You can sleep here tonight if ya want. I have an extra blanket in that drawer over there," Hiyori didn't answer him back, instead she stared absently into space, not snapping out of trance until Shinji tugged her gripping arm clinging to his.

"Are you going to leave if I do?" She followed his statement, curling her lip in a pout.

"Nah, I'm too comfortable here." He reassured her curtly. After several serene draws of breath later, Shinji was confidant that the girl had fallen asleep next to him, but when Hiyori dug her nails into his arm, he took it as a universal sign that he was very sadly mistaken.

"That Quincy you shot your cero at today, why were you really fighting with him?" Hiyori asserted.

A sigh brushed past a circular tongue ring. "You want an answer now Hiyori? Can't we just sleep instead?" He whined.

"No!" Hiyori growled. Shinji felt his arm set a blaze as she dug deeper into his flesh.

"Look, I don't know….." he lied, hoping Hiyori would just drop the whole thing and let him sleep.

"Shinji…" Now the little pigtailed horror had broke the older vizard's skin, drawing drops of blood.

"Okay, Okay…just promise me ya won't rip my arm off when I tell ya." Shinji cautiously announced his disclaimer before beginning in his forced confession. "So there was a girl….a girl that I guess the Quincy thought was his girlfriend but _obviously_ wasn't, and I don't know….I guess he got possessive or jealous bout' the fact she was sitting too close to me in class, and so four eyes caught me outside after class and got real ballsy bout' it… So I shot em' a couple warning shots to get em' off my back. There, yer satisfied Hiyori?"

The snaggle toothed preteen said nothing for several seconds; making the battered vizard brace his entire body from the upcoming pummeling he predicted would happen after such a daunting admission. But when the beating never came…he grew concerned enough to gingerly nudge her on her side to see if she was okay. Hiyori in turn, remained stagnant to his warm touch, staring up at the office ceiling deep in thought.

"You know why I hate you so much Shinji?" Hiyori finally said. Shinji didn't answer even though she was directly addressing him; instead he followed her glaze to the same dingy ceiling tile hanging above the old clot they laid on.

"It's not the fact that you push all my buttons, or the fact that your overbite really pisses me off…." Hiyori trailed over, her face fell away from her glaze from ceiling and on to Shinji's face as she paused.

"It's because you always fall for the pretty ones," Shinji noticed the strain in her voice under the pressure of her clenched teeth, and it made a knot form at the base of his throat. "So Shinji…... is this girl you were fighting over one of em'?" Hiyori asked.

"One of what," the older vizard spurred out playing dumb.

"The pretty ones you dumbass…Gawd haven't you been listening to a word I've said so far?" Shinji flinched in pain when the feisty petite blond slapped his shoulder in annoyance.

"Hmm…I didn't notice," Shinji lied again rubbing his bruised shoulder.

"You're a bald faced liar, ya know that," Hiyori yawned.

A silent grin widen on the older blond vizard's face, "go to sleep Hiyori, I know yer tired."

"Shut up," A rolling yawn drowned out the rest of the preteen vizard's insult, making her heavy eye lids flutter briefly before slipping into a peaceful slumber.

"Good night short stack," Shinji whispered back, brushing back the wild blond strands from her face.

The moon light stubbornly shined through the dirty unwashed window of the cramped office space, cascading a radiant blue tint over the entire four corners of the room, and although the former captain wanted to use that as an excuse for not being able to sleep, he knew that it was be further away than the truth that he could get. Shinji tried to cease from the troubling thoughts that rotted in the back of his mind, but the harder he tried the more his unsettling thoughts would resurface again, leaving him sleep deprived. For hours the vizard was restless in his attempts to fall asleep, only succeeding at two short durations of sleep that were accompanied by heavy nightmares of Aizen standing victorious over the dead bodies of his vizard family. In the long run, after so many jolting persistence night terrors of the same horrifying dream, the vizard decided to give up on the idea of sleep and opted for a late night cigarette outside to calm his nerves. Conscientious of having the petite pigtailed blond still clung to his arm, he carefully slipped out of her tight grip as not to disturb her and he grabbed a fleece blanket and placed it over her heavily sedated body. Next he replaced his singed tattered clothing and sliced tie with fresh clothes he had laid out for class, expecting that he'd get back by morning to maintain his ridiculous charade of being a Karakura high school student. With an unopened pack of cigarettes and everything else he needed packed and ready, he silently stalked his way towards the exit.

"Shinji, where are you going," the rustling of bed sheets followed Hiyori's sleepy voice behind him when he reached for the office doorknob.

"Can't sleep, so I'm going outside to smoke a quick cigarette and then take a patrol round' the grounds." Shinji responded back in a cool whisper.

"It's the damn dream again isn't it?" Hiyori guessed groggily. Not wanting the vizard to be alone after his night terrors, like many nights she had witness the older vizard have before, she flung her legs over the edge of the bed wanting to join him.

"You ain't gotta go worryin' bout' me," the petite preteen followed Shinji's answer with a long tiring yawn.

"I'll be back before ya know it. If anything happens, I'll call in a progress report. Now go back to bed, yer can hardly keep your eyes open." His voice was low but firm enough to make the younger pigtailed vizard halt in place, before the bottom of her feet touched the cold floor. She groaned loudly and rolled back onto the cot, rolling on her side and pulling the cover over her gruffly.

"Just don't do anything more stupid than usual baldy," Hiyori grumbled as her eyes fell heavy again over her exhausted face.

Shinji scoffed out loud, surprised to see that even half asleep the blonde sandaled assailant was as cheeky and mouthy as she was awake. "Yeah whatever, just don't wait up snaggletooth," he droned into the dark with a menacing wide grin. Hiyori grunted then chortled a snore, a definite sure fire flag that if Shinji didn't leave now that he may not be able to later. Leaving his made shift office room with swift flash step, the fleeting vizard creaked open the door slightly on his way out, letting the lamp lights of the dimly lit living room momentarily shine across the sleeping freckled preteen's face, before he finally made his break towards the vizard compound's exit.

Mashiro's nose bubble burst, waking her up from her cozy slumber next to Kensei on the vizard loveseat in the living room, when the sound of Shinji's lanky strut shuffled past them on his way out. "Where are you going so late at night," she lazily moaned.

"Out," Shinji simply replied in a whisper, still walking towards the door with his hands shoved in his pockets.

A deep yawn rolled off the green haired vizard tongue making her voice sound intelligible when she mumbled, "Don't smoke all the cancer sticks or dummy Kensei will get mad."

"Eh, just tell Kensei I owe him a pack of cancer then," Shinji playfully teased aloud with an unlit cigarette in his mouth and a departing half wave goodbye to the groggy former lieutenant. The blond vizard could have sworn Mashiro uttered goodbye back under the suffocation of Kensei's obnoxious snores, though Shinji didn't stick around long enough to decipher it.

* * *

Once outside, the door shut with an ungodly thud accompanied by a high pitched creek. Shinji imagined that it was from the horrible attempt of putting the door back on its hinges after being so violently hurled against it earlier by Lisa, and by the patches of Kido welding holding the pathetic thing together, he rightfully suspected it was Hachi's well doing. After all, it was stereotypical of the Kido master turned peacemaker of the vizard clan to be the rational adult when the rest of his family turned to childish high jinks to fuel their numerous tantrums against each other. Better Hachi than me, Shinji thought, especially since he really wasn't the ideal role model. Heck… even Aizen was astute enough to point that out when he mercilessly teased Hiyori, and selfishly partook in his many vices back in the soul society. Hirako glowered to himself, lighting his cigarette systematically with the fading recollection slowly dissolving into the starry night sky above him. Though the vizard was unfathomed by the lack of hollows despite the various human reiatsu flaring up against his sensors, he readily digressed; eventually turning a sharp corner towards the only late night store still open past midnight in the sleepy town.

"Man you're right she's so hot! I wish she went to my school," a scrawny teen dreamily whined. The rest of the gang either nodded or formed their own cat calls at the sight of the mysterious woman inside the twenty four hour convenience store. Curious to see what the big fuss was about, Shinji stopped his nightly stroll just in time to set his eyes on a certain familiar curvy voluptuous figure carrying out a full set of groceries in each hand. Observing quietly on the side lines, he put out his menthol cigarette on the store sidewalk, waiting for the perfect opening to set his devious plot of conquest in motion.

"Hey babe, how bout I help you with those groceries and you thank me later at my place?" One of the hormonal teens brashly spoke out.

Orihime laughed nervously, gripping her bags closer to body, an obvious body sign that she was uncomfortable with the gang's vulgar sexual advances. "Umm…no thanks," she whimpered.

"You sure…because I would hate to see a pretty young thing like, have to carry all those bags without a boyfriend to help you," Another boy called out and whistled.

Having heard enough, the vizard stepped forward intent on derailing the Orihime Inoe fan club train dead in its tracks."He's right ya know. I wouldn't want my girlfriend carrying all those groceries back to our place without any of my help," Shinji boldly intervened, pulling the startled teen girl by her waist possessively next to his.

Orihime squealed an exaggerated "Ekkk", taken aback by the sudden appearance of her vizard classmate gripping her side seductively.

"You mean _you're_ the one dating hottest girl in school?" Two of the boys moaned disappointed in unison.

"Yep, the one and only…" Shinji grinned widely from ear to ear, the glinting smile was enough to send waves of chills down the teen spectator's spines, and a flushing red blush across Orihime's face.

"Hey aren't you the new transfer student? How did you manage to get a hottie like Orihime, so fast? How do I know if you're just making it up?" The older of the four teen boys exclaimed, crossing his rigid arms across his huffing chest. Apparently the plain gawky teen was a long time suitor of the busty goddess since grade school, and the prospect of anyone else but Kurosaki as a potential romantic rival, sent him at arms with jealousy and suspicion.

The blond vizard hopelessly sighed, he just couldn't believe how incredibly dense these idiots really were, even by human standards. Evidently, the vizard would have to resort to drastic measures to disband this merry minstrel of imbeciles, or else they would never believe him. However, his plot on how to go about was simple enough, but whether his curvy crush would forgive him afterwards, was a whole another story entirely.

Orihime felt strands of auburn hair framing her porcelain face, being tenderly tucked behind her ear by long supple fingers. She flinched, completely wide eyed by the faltering touch, breathing heavily at the sensation of the vizard's hot breath trailing sweetly on her reddening ear," I apologize now… just play along, I'll explain later" Shinji quietly explicated.

"But-"Shinji's lips crushed over hers passionately, smothering any of Orihime's scanty efforts of formulating words to express her sputtering confusion of what was happening.

"Aww man…did he just kiss her? She really must be going out with him." One of the teens bawled at the sight.

"Ugh that's it, I've seen enough…guys let's go" The older ringleader announced in a mixture of displeasure and nausea. "It's getting late anyways…" He added, leaving with the rest of his scattering posse.

Shinji parted his lingering kiss, watching the small mob dissemble in the distance. He smirked satisfactory at his astonished classmate, delighted she didn't slap him clear across his face as soon as he pulled away from his kiss.

"Coast is clear, you can breathe now darlin'." The vizard remarked at her frozen state.

Orihime's brows knitted into a mystified frown, unclear of what to say. Shinji grimaced, knowing all too well his over stepped his boundaries, though admittedly he enjoyed it. "Sorry, but I had to make it convincing. They were startin' to suspect I wasn't the love of your life," the vizard divulged.

"No, it's not that…It's just, I-I can't believe it's really you." The color drained from her flustered face, causing the vizard to become tense.

"Geez, you make me feel as if I were dead or something," Shinji snorted.

The gray eyed teen pulled the tattered beige remains of the newsboy hat from her purse, handing it to the vizard while she recommenced. "When I asked Uryu about you, he didn't say much. He only said that you were okay. But when I found your hat…." Orihime recoiled in concern fidgeting with the hemline of her skirt and staring down timidly at the sidewalk, "I just wasn't sure you were okay."

"Oh, you must be talking about what happened with me and Mr. wonderful personality today. Well, let's just say that was a case of being at the right place at the wrong time…but let's not talk about that right now, darlin'." the vizard lagged off cunningly, averting the entire subject riddled with details he couldn't reveal further to humans, especially to the friends of his intended mission target. "Instead, let me make up the kiss I just stole from ya, by helping ya with yer bags." Shinji gallantly propositioned, shoving his disheveled hat into his back pocket.

"Umm...I don't know," Orihime hesitated at the suggestion, now secretly fuming about the bombarded kiss, he refreshed to memory.

"Aww C'mon…girls like you shouldn't be prowling the streets this late at night anyways," the former Shinigami artfully disputed. Orihime bit her bottom lip retrospectively, pondering his plea.

"Girls like me?" She repeated.

Shinji smiled, "The pretty girls…there's an awful lot of perverts out there ya know. I wouldn't want any of em' to get fresh with ya."

Amused by the grand irony of Shinji last assertion, Orihime ultimately caved in to his request, handing the vizard one of her bulky grocery bags. "Okay but only if you promise to not surprise kiss me again."

The vizard classmate impishly grinned, crossing his fingers behind his back to her promise. "Sure, you have my word gorgeous, Scout's honor."

"Good, I live just a couple of block from here." She pointed up north, smiling amiably.

"Lead the way, and I shall follow love." Beamed her adoring blond admirer, striding alongside her as he hung to every word she mustered to chatter along the way. After all, Shinji didn't mind the sudden off and on again dry spells of casual conversation that would transpire from the awkward silences. In fact, he even enjoyed the dull small talk laced with the occasional flirtation, even succeeding at making her laugh a few times with his horrible jokes and sharp wit.

"It's the third apartment to the left, passed these stairs." Orihime explained walking up the stairs ahead of her willing escort.

"Wait, won't you parents mind me barging in with you, this late at night?" The vizard shot out concerned, outside her dimly lit apartment door.

Orihime fumbled with her apartment keys, forgetting which one was the front door key in the assortment of her heavily adorned keychain, delaying her answer to her classmate until she found the right key; she paused opening the door before them. "No...I sorta live alone," she replied. Hinting sadness in her response, the vizard didn't push forward to ask why.

"You can set the bag over there on the table." Shinji followed her order setting the hulking bag down, and then actively scoped the apartment's surroundings. "Nice place ya got here… real cozy," he finally complimented with an eye full of the room.

"Thanks," She smiled setting her own bag next to his on the kitchen table. Setting some food items aside, Orihime continued, now extending her warming hospitability to her visitor. "Can I get you a coke or anything to drink?"

"Nah, I'm good beautiful...Thanks," he responded back, as the teen momentarily ducked into a kitchen cupboard, unloading some few choice groceries.

"You know, I really can't begin to repay you for saving me today. I feel I owe you one, those guys were starting me a bad case of the creeps." She innocently paused inattentive for a minute, "No…wait two, I owe you two. I forgot how you saved me from our Chemistry experiment too. Wow, I must seem like the most disaster prone person in the world." Orihime cringed insecurely.

"Tch, those guys were grade-A jerks if you ask me. I just couldn't stand by anymore and watch em' try those terrible pick up lines on ya. So, I figured I'd knock off another good deed for the day and get rid of em' for ya. Besides…" Shinji followed his rambling answer with a placid sigh as he idly made himself a home on the young girl's comfy couch. "I've always had a thing for saving disaster prone girls."

Emerging from the kitchen, the teen girl desperately tried to pacify the glowing red tint spreading across her face, but when she spotted the new transfer student's grin widen at the sight of her, she knew she had failed miserably at her efforts.

"Not like it's any of my business, but do you mind telling me why you were doing your grocery shopping so late at night," questioned the vizard curiously.

"Oh right, well it's just I've been so busy lately that I sorta neglected some of my duties, including the grocery shopping." A loud stomach growl preceded her reply. Laughing nervously, she embraced her abdominals trying to drown the next following churns of hunger.

"Aha," the vizard gathered at the tip of his tongue at the sound of the gut rumble and instant soup on the kitchen table. "Well the next time you're fighting an empty stomach, you should give me a call. I know of this one real swanky Italian restaurant across town that beats Ramon any time of the week." Shinji coolly implied rising from his comfortable seat on the couch.

"O' um….I wouldn't want to impose," Orihime timorously replied.

"Trust me beautiful, dining with you instead of the usual schmucks I eat out with, couldn't be imposing even if ya tried. In fact, Friday is one of the viza- err-I mean, one of my sister's so called board game nights, and I wouldn't mind having an excuse for blowin' that Popsicle stand." Shinji bolstered, closing the gap of space separating him and the shapely teen.

"You mean, you…me…go on a date Friday?" She inquisitively questioned, peering up at the vizard's piercing hazel eyes.

"Date, schmate, gathering, meeting, it's all the same love, just as long as you say yes…." He nonchalantly weaved past his pierced tongue, analyzing the undecided expression dawning across his crush's face as she fiddled with her fingers tentatively.

"Actually...Friday might be bad for me; since I've sorta already promised Tatsuki and Ichigo that we would go see that new horror movie at the mall. I heard its good, but Tatsuki says it's not as good as the first movie, which I thought was really scary…except for the scene when the alien octopus climbs out of the ocean to fight the reptilian dinosaur, and you can clearly see the zipper from the back…and-I." Shinji lightly exhaled, softly pressing his finger against Orihime's glossy lips causing her to halt her ongoing sprawling recount of the horror blockbuster from enduring much longer.

"Tell ya what, how about I leave ya my number and whenever you decide to ditch Kurosaki and Arisawa for a real night out on the town, you give me a ring." The vizard murmured, suspending his thin lips seductively over hers.

"I uh…." Her heart thumped erratically against her chest, drowning out any rational articulation she wanted to convey back in the midst of the vizard's lips rimming the outline of her mouth.

"Think about it," Shinji advocated, wringing one arm around her small waist and the other in her sweater pocket with his business card.

The teen immobilizes in place, feeling the searing heat of the vizard's spiritual pressure envelop her as his daring embrace constricted tighter around her securely. Initially submitting to former captain's strong reiatsu sending an inviting warm shiver down her spine, but when she identified another proverbial reiatsu intermingling with a rippling hollow roar in the distance, she mechanically curls her fingers in terror.

"Ichigo…" she gasps wide eyed in repulsion.

"Stupid kid releasing all his spiritual pressure likes this," He irritably growled through grinding teeth, midway of the disrupted kiss.

"What?" Orihime exclaimed unnerved, not fully grasping his last subdued statement.

"I said that I'm afraid you're mistaking me for someone else." The vizard breathed out disappointed. He paused briefly turning away from her and meeting the teen's serious gape over his tortured face. "Thanks for the hospitality and for the hat Hime, but I really gotta get going. I just remembered that I have some unfinished business I need to attend to. So try to not get into too much trouble while I'm gone." He finished, leaving in an unsettling rush.

Panic stricken, Inoe exerts out a straggled, "wait!" Only to have the diminishing reiatsu of her evading houseguest smother it with an echoing silence, seeping through her partially open door.

* * *

Teeming on the outskirts of central Karakura, the blond materializes his sword with a flick of a wrist, ready to break contact at the sight of his romantic adversary. _He's leaking far too much spiritual pressure even Orihime felt it ; at this rate he'll be drawing in every strong hollow in a 50 mile radius to the center of town. If I hurry, I can stop him before the idiot lures out something much more than he can handle. _Shinji thought, tracking the gushing overflow of Ichigo's reiatsu to a neighboring rooftop. "Well I suppose this is a better time than any," He self motivates, launching off his scouting perch.

Ascending in an inverted levitation behind the clueless Shinigami, the vizard pulled his Sakanade promptly from its bright red sheath, striking the teen boy with a diluted swing to secure his new recruit's attention. To the new transfer student's surprise, his opponent reencounters and thwarts his ensnaring attack with honed reflexes.

"Damnit Hirako…Is that a zanpakutō? Who the hell are you?" The orange haired substitute Shinigami furiously yelled in perplexity, while still fending off his blond attacker with his drawn sword.

"Shhhhhh," Shinji hushed with a finger over his pressed lips. "You mustn't make too much noise Ichigo Kurosaki. Those who have spiritual pressure like you possess need to learn how to stay calm or… your presence will be felt." He composedly illuminated.

"Felt by whom? Who will feel it?" Ichigo angrily demanded.

"It seems I need everything to be in the open for **you** to understand it…Children are so foolish and blind." He severely chides.

**And then an immense garganta ruptured through the still night sky….**

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**_**A/N:** Please read my profile for the latest updates on this story! TY, and I love all my loyal readers._


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